About This Book
Reach for this book when you are ready to introduce the history of the Holocaust or when your child is exploring how communities maintain hope during times of extreme hardship. While the setting is a concentration camp, the narrative focuses on the profound resilience of the human spirit and the ways in which adults protect the childhood of those younger than themselves through creativity and love. This is a story about making something from nothing to ensure joy can still exist. Margaret Wild uses gentle but honest prose to describe Miriam, a girl who remembers life before the camp and helps the women sew scrap-cloth toys for a liberation party. The book balances the heavy reality of the setting with the warmth of communal action. It is an ideal entry point for children ages 7 to 12 to discuss empathy, history, and the power of hope, providing a safe space to process difficult historical truths through a lens of human kindness.
